entranceway | [video] once there was a way to get back homeward

[It wasn't enough, she thinks, to lose so much back home that she had to return here to another loss she was only just rebuilding. It wasn't enough to take away, it wasn't enough to really hurt, no, to quietly return to a familiar room, empty with its vast walls and dark corners. Slowly she filled it again, odds and ends of furniture and the trappings of a home to which she can never return.

She has a reputation to uphold even in spite of the circumstances, better to nurse the greatest wound out of the public eye, a garish scar across her stomach. Evelyn could swear the blade reached her heart.

The exhaustion nestles deep into her bones, a palpable chill that reminds her what she is.

What she isn't.]

I've been informed I was away for a little while, [she addresses the network, unable to muster more than a tired smile.] Perhaps someone might catch me up. I'll be-

[For a moment Evelyn appears distracted, hand gravitating toward her waist.]

I'll be in the library. I've also got several, erm, dogs that need homes. Please let me know if you're interested.

Private to Philip, 11:31 AM
I’m back. May I come and see you? It's important.
-E

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

[Part of her is afraid to start looking when the odds seem to lean heavily in favour of "no one leaves, not now, not ever." Wonderland has a habit of forcing its residents into precarious positions and theirs is a very specific niche of Involuntary Guest. Even with Philip's reassurance - one of the strongest and most resolute she has heard in some time - it is hard not to be dissuaded from the endeavour by hypothetical impossibility.

Evelyn remembers her last return and their estrangement, reaching across a table that felt like a vast chasm for the hand of a dead man who curled his fingers in and pulled away. Philip leans forward now, and takes her hands in his, slipping to her wrists and pressing a pulse beneath her fingertips. The contact from another person itself is almost more validating than her own heartbeat, swallowing a protest that being "alive" shouldn't feel this cold.

She never did wear cynicism well.]

Thank you.

[video] once there was a way to get back homeward

action;